Who Should Romney Pick for Vice President?

June 26 (Bloomberg) -- Mitt Romney’s running mate is going
to rank very low on the list of what’s on voters’ minds in
November. Political journalists are obsessing about whom he’ll
pick anyway, because it is one of the biggest remaining unknowns
about the race. Even better, it creates opportunities for
speculation.

The speculators place high value on excitement. They’re
talking up potential vice-presidential candidates who would
represent a demographic first, or an ideological statement, or
play to a state or region. My guess is that Romney is looking at
this in a completely different way.

If I’m right, Romney will be looking for three qualities
that don’t generate buzz. He’ll want someone he considers able
to step into the role of president if needed; someone loyal; and
someone with whom he feels personally comfortable. Romney’s main
political consideration will be whether the running mate
reinforces the message that he is a dependable, competent,
reassuring candidate who will oversee an administration with
those same features.

He will of course want someone who is acceptable to
conservatives, evangelicals and other Republican groups. He will
not, however, be desperate for a running mate who appeals
specifically to them, because he thinks that they’re likely to
vote for him over President Barack Obama anyway.

White Guys

Taken together, these criteria work against conservative
heartthrob Marco Rubio, the senator from Florida. Romney and
Rubio don’t seem to have much of a personal relationship. Rubio
has no executive experience. And Romney probably considers Rubio
unseasoned, which he is. Representative Paul Ryan, another
conservative favorite, has more experience but has never been an
executive or even won a statewide race. Those weaknesses may
take him off the list.

The criteria just mentioned work in favor of an all-white-guys ticket. Most Republican politicians, and especially the
more-established ones, are white guys, after all. So unless
Romney puts a thumb on the scale for diversity, he is likely to
end up with one of them.

Although Christie seems to want the slot, he may have taken
himself out of contention by repeatedly saying he isn’t ready to
be president. That’s a comment that would be hard to walk away
from.

Most Republican insiders think highly of Portman, and many
say that picking him would generate a little helpful press in
his home state. Because he served in George W. Bush’s
administration as budget director and trade representative, his
selection would also make it easier for the Obama campaign to
claim that Romney is just trying to go backward -- a charge that
Republicans have not yet figured out how to answer.

Like Portman, McDonnell comes from a swing state where he’s
popular. Some Republicans worry, though, that Democrats and the
national press would be able to portray him as a social-issues
extremist because of some of the abortion bills Virginia
legislators have pushed.

Kyl is a long shot. He is well-respected, and Romney may
value his years of work on national-security issues.
Conservatives around the country aren’t begging for him to be on
the ticket -- most of them don’t know who he is -- but if he
were picked they would discover that he has a very conservative
record on economic and social issues.

Sweet Spot

Pawlenty and Thune have been touted as potential running
mates for some of the same reasons. They’re both from the upper
Midwest, evangelical Christians and considered attractive. None
of those is an especially good reason for putting either of them
on the ticket.

There are better reasons for picking Pawlenty. As a two-term governor he reined in spending and took on public-sector
unions. Thune has fewer accomplishments, having no signature
legislative issues. Pawlenty has a good relationship with
Romney, for whom he has been tirelessly stumping. Having run for
president, Pawlenty has a better sense than any of the other
people on the list about what that level of politics is like.
His working-class background is a modest plus, and he is a more
energetic speaker than Portman.

Jindal is the only potential vice-presidential candidate
who hits the sweet spot: He is simultaneously a conservative
favorite, demographically interesting (he’s a Catholic of Indian
ancestry), and a reform-minded, competent governor. Pawlenty and
Jindal, then, are the two candidates with the strongest cases.

If Romney picks Kyl, McDonnell, Pawlenty, Portman or Thune
-- anyone on this list, that is, but Christie or Jindal -- he
should make the announcement soon. None of those guys is going
to excite the Republican convention, so there is no point in
waiting for it. The longer Romney waits, the more conservatives
will speculate about candidates like Rubio and the more many of
them will feel let down by a choice that isn’t designed to give
them the rush of momentary excitement.

If Romney is going to do something boring, in other words,
he should at least do it in a novel way.

(Ramesh Ponnuru is a Bloomberg View columnist and a senior
editor at National Review. The opinions expressed are his own.)